One of a Kind (2nd Edition)

JUMPING IN WITH BOTH FEET

SIX

of them made a beeline for Beach Road Camp in Nang Poh’s car to collect the application

forms and a few days later, turned up at Inspector Lim Choon Mong’s recruiting office.

When they passed the selection tests and were offered a place, their soul-searching about

missing out on a university education was but brief. For Nang Poh, SAFTI proved to be

a homecoming of sorts because his family owned the famous Hill 160 (Spot Height 160),

better known as Red House Hill.

Ibrahim Bulat’s father was a Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM) in the Singapore Volunteer

Corps and a much-feared one at that. In 1963 after Singapore had joined Malaysia, Ibrahim,

who had initially toyed around with the idea of being a teacher, applied to join the Federal

Police Force and was waiting to board the 9.00 pm train to Kuala Lumpur at Tanjong Pagar

Railway Station. Suddenly, he found the RSM standing next to him, shortly after which he

was a pillion rider on the latter’s motorcycle on his way home. The next day, RSM Bulat as

he was known, pulled his son ‘by the ear’ to the recruiting officer for the SVC and asked

him to sign up as a Volunteer. Ibrahim, to keep a healthy distance from the RSM, signed

up in the Artillery instead of the Infantry. He reported for his training faithfully while

keeping his day job as an interpreter in the Marine Department. On 28

August, 1964, he

was mobilised and was deployed with units participating in anti-riot operations in Geylang

and later against Indonesian Confrontation, with the rank of Lance Bombardier, Signaller.

Ibrahim recalls that he frequently took flak from officers, including his battery commander,

Lieutenant Kwek Boon Yong, (later Lieutenant-Colonel and Chief Artillery Officer), for his

father’s strictness in dealing with errant subalterns. He had begun to feel that he was being

denied a chance for a commission in the Volunteers even though several others who were

quite ‘lopong’ were selected for the course. When the opportunity for officer cadet training

in SAFTI came up, he did not hesitate for a moment. He promised his Battery Commander

that whether it took him one year or three, he would be back as a commissioned officer.

Soldiering could not have been further from Yeow Yew Tong’s mind as a career when

he fatefully returned to Singapore in the first week of June 1966 from a Colombo Plan

scholarship with a First Class Honours in Electrical Engineering. Together with a stable-

mate who is remembered only as Foo or Fong, he found himself persuaded to go (some

would say bundled-off) to SAFTI six days after the course began, together with 25-year

old graduate teacher Ramachandran Menon, who for some unaccountable reason had been

held back working in MID HQ after reporting to Beach Road Camp instead of being sent

directly to SAFTI with the majority of the selected candidates. Yew Tong’s consolation was

that even if he had proceeded to an Administrative Service appointment to serve his bond,

he would have been enlisted under the National Service Act one year later, under either the

compulsory active service scheme for new civil servants (Compulsory Active Service) or the

Institutions of Higher Learning category. As it was, he did not do too badly in the order

of merit, gamely taking everything that was dished out to cadets, his steel helmet wobbling

alarmingly on his head. On being commissioned, he served in the Signals, before migrating

overseas. Foo-Fong, on the other hand, dropped out early during recruit training and is

untraceable through available records. He may have got away by successfully challenging the